Its Never Just Yoga - With Aneta Pietruszko

In this episode, we welcome the very first guest to The Summit Effect: my dear friend, Aneta Pietruszko, owner of Burlington Power Yoga Canada and co-owner of Soulfull Yoga and Wellness Retreats.

Aneta's journey didn't begin in a yoga studio. It began in the corporate world, where anxiety and panic attacks became the breadcrumbs that ultimately led her toward a completely different life. Together, we explore how our bodies often speak long before our minds are ready to listen, why movement can become medicine, and how healing isn't always something that happens on a treatment table. This conversation is about the science of nervous system regulation, the spirituality of following your intuition, and the many forms that energy work can take. Whether you've ever rolled out a yoga mat or not, this episode is an invitation to notice the breadcrumbs your own life has been leaving for you.

In this episode:

• The difference between success on paper and feeling aligned in your life
• How yoga became more than exercise—it became a pathway back to herself
• What it feels like to hold space for hundreds of people in a yoga class
• The many ways people process emotion through movement
• How teaching yoga is a form of energy work
• Why Reiki helped expand—not create—Aneta's understanding of healing
• How music, intention, and presence can change the energy of a room
• The art of creating playlists 
• Community as medicine
• Learning to trust the breadcrumbs that continue to guide us throughout life

Summit takeaway: Your life rarely changes because of one big moment. More often, it changes because you finally decide to follow the breadcrumbs your body has been leaving for you all along.

You can find Aneta on instagram: @anetapie_ or @burlingtonpyc or @soulfullyogawellness

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to the Summit of Map, where science meets all and don't have to pick one or the other. Hi, I'm your host, Elena Croft, osteopathic manual practitioner inviting out here. On the pod, we're talking about body wisdom, energy, and wishment, and becoming an expert on our own life. Whether you're looking to find yourself again, creative person, or see just here for the results, you're in the right place. I'm here to justify spiritual curiosities while adding a layer of humanness to the healthcare experience. No gatekeeping, no body. This podcast is for the woman who is ready to take her power back. Let's do it. Hello everyone. Happy Wednesday. Uh today is the day. Our very first guest on the Summit Effect. She is Sunshine in Human Form, the one and only Annetta Petrusco. I was really working on her last name, guys. Um, even though we've known each other for six years now. So Aneta is the owner of Burlington Power Yoga Canada. She's whom I refer to as Burlington's local celebrity because she is the ultimate community builder and supporter. Burley PYC is so much more than just a yoga studio, and that is thanks to its fearless leader who has put her blood, sweat, and tears into making the studio the pinnacle of what it feels like to belong to something or to be a part of something bigger than yourself. She's also a musical wizard and a healer in so many ways, and we're going to get to that in the show, we will get to that. But Aneta is one of the kindest, most genuine humans I know. I am honored to call her my friend Aneta. Welcome to the Summit Effect.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

Wow, what kind of intro is that?

SPEAKER_00 1:48

Thank you so much. I feel like I could have gone on forever. I'm like, they'll get it, they'll get it, they'll get it. Um, okay, so we're, I want to just jump right into this because I think that we know, and a lot of the Burlington community knows who you are now. But one thing um my audience hears me talk about a lot is something we call breadcrumbs. And um, I think most people imagine like when you have changes in in your life, it's like some one big moment that just kind of flips you. Um but when I look back at my own life and when I look at the lives of my clients, it doesn't really happen that way. It's usually like little nudges, signs, whispers, moments of discomfort, um, and often physical symptoms, which I think we'll get into with you, that point us in a direction kind of long before we can see how it's going to unfold. Um, those are what I call breadcrumbs. So looking back now, what were the breadcrumbs that eventually led you to yoga?

SPEAKER_02 2:49

Oh wow, okay. Breadcrumbs that led me to yoga. The first thing I think about since I go right to the beginning was actually in my body. I ended up just developing crazy anxiety that I didn't know why or where or how it started. And I was recommended by my doctor to make some changes, and so he gave me two options it was yoga or medication, and so I said I'll try yoga, but I had a lot of resistance around it because I was, you know, I love sports, I love things in movement, and my the picture in my head of like what a yogi is was definitely not like how do I fit into that role? Um, but I said, okay, I'm gonna try it. And then not too long after that, uh, since I told my dad about my appointment, he bought me my first uh yoga pass. And so he said, These two girls just opened up a Power Yoga Canada behind my shop. Um, while I fix your car, why don't you go take a class? Let me know how it feels. And so I took that first class and I don't know what happened. I mean, I didn't know anything. I was like, this room, everyone's breathing, Darth Vader. What is a down dog? Holy shit, I don't belong here, but I like it. Why am I sweating? Um, and in all of that, that night I slept the best. The next day, I felt like, I don't know, my thoughts had a little bit more space in between. I didn't feel that like anxious thoughts that started off my day. I woke up like pretty um grounded. And so I started this 40-day program, and then that is where the trajectory just went um to teacher training, uh, and then Bob's your uncle became a yoga teacher.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

Totally. I I love that you said I had so much resistance to it because I actually have this as a question. I know for myself the things that change me the most are the things I'm most resistant to. I'm like absolutely not, no way it feels like visceral in my body along this trajectory, even from you know, your move, working another studio, opening Burley PYC. Did you hit that resistance ever again?

SPEAKER_02 5:09

Oh, uh, I think the resistance is a constant for me. I I catch it, I'm much more aware of it, but I no longer like the resistance, it's almost like I've become an observer to it. I'm not so uh resistant to the resistance. I'll be like, okay, it's coming up, I'm feeling it. And what kind of information is here? And so I allow myself to let it percolate versus shutting the door. So now it's very much like, okay, I've I've felt this before, I've had incredible things come from this place. Let's just see what will you know what's what's possible.

SPEAKER_00 5:47

I love that. Yeah. Um what do you this is probably a really broad-based question, but give it to me. What do you think yoga was giving you that nothing else was giving you at that time?

SPEAKER_02 6:07

Great question. Uh I think I tend, I grew up pretty much being pretty good at sports. You give me a ball, I'll be able to work it. The yoga practice, I was not great at all. I I'm telling you, it was it was embarrassing. I was the one in the back, um, you know, looking around, not feeling great, but I felt that nobody was looking at me. I say this to my students all the time. We think that like everybody sees what we're doing. No, no one's paying attention because everyone's dying. Everyone is sweaty, everyone's in their own shit, right? Everyone's dying. Accurate in your class. Only to be reborn. Just saying. Um, what was it giving me? It was giving me a moment to uh learn about my breath. I've never, ever experienced any kind of movement where the breath was such a huge component to the result of the workout, to the result of um the yoga practice. And the more I breathed and learned how to breathe, I didn't know how to breathe. Like we breathe, shallow breathing. But what is Ujayi breath? That's like another podcast. Um, but it slowed my world down and nothing else really did because I was always in more of the high-impact sports. Um, so I would say that yoga definitely provided me a space where it was almost like you know, these horse blinders were on. And I say that sometimes too. It's just me, breath, sweat. Yeah, it could be a room of 30, but it didn't even, I don't even look anywhere because I was just so into the breath work. And then that piece, I take that to Starbucks. I take that to, you know, um, a really hard conversation just before it, I start, you know, the breath. And it all came from that. I never knew how much it's supported me in all of these different ways, and that going into my first class, I had no idea that that would be the thing that would keep me coming back.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

I I just had such a big aha moment with you because when we talk about, like on the podcast and in life, and we've probably had this conversation too, how do you become intuitive? How do you open all these gifts? I'm like, it's it's the breath. You have to breathe. I remember going to my first like mediumship um certification, and she's like, I know you all want some magic tricks, but like if you can't breathe, if you can't do breath work, you can't be a medium. And so my aha moment here of like how you're such a miracle worker is the breath. It all comes back to the breath for you. So a little bit of a segue here, but to build on that, I feel like I um forced you to go to your Reiki level one because I just think you're such a healer. Um you're such a healer, and sometimes Reiki is just a tool, right? You feel it through your hands, and I think that for you too, um you did the level one and you were kind of like, well, it's like this isn't really it for me, but as you know, you've progressed in your journey and everything and learn more. What how do you see energy work from that version of Anetta to now?

SPEAKER_02 9:39

From that level one Reiki to now?

SPEAKER_00 9:41

Yeah, how has how has it how has it changed? I think sometimes we think like energy work is just in your hands, and I think you know it's not.

SPEAKER_02 9:52

You know, I love that you said that because I did have it as that that Reiki is about the hands, and I think you were in my class where I I was close by or you were in tree. Yeah, I remember the one in tree. Oh, yeah. And then all of a sudden it was you and I both got goosebumps, and I had asked you about it, and you said that you had goosebumps at the same time, and so yes, that was with hands, but I just I feel that now it's energy is energy, and you talking about the breath, when I'm in my feet and I'm teaching, and then I take that exhale, and I I have a moment in that you know, the pause between the inhale and the exhale. I don't know, you look around and I just I dial in, I can tune in to people on a deeper level. Um you've always reminded me that your Reiki is turned on, and I look around the room. I room, my thank God I'm very happy and blessed and grateful that my rooms are busy and and packed. It's like, what is it? What is it? Is it tangible? I don't know. I don't think so. I think there is this, of course, energetic component that brings people together that I feel so connected to. And so now, yeah, I do Reiki.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

Totally you do.

SPEAKER_02 11:17

I do Reiki in my classes.

SPEAKER_00 11:19

I think I think we make energy work too small. We put it in a box, right? Rub your hands, put your hands on me. But it's so much more than that. Like I see it in your class, in you, in your teaching, but I see people come in, um, you know, they probably cried on the way there, or they're anxious, or somebody is looking around, kind of like afraid to talk to somebody, and everybody leaves, like high-fiving, laughing, hugging. Like, if that's not energy work, I don't, I don't know what is.

SPEAKER_02 11:51

100%. And I think one of the biggest energy exchange invitations that I always start in my class is turn to the person to your to you and introduce yourself. That is an energy exchange. And immediately, if in my classes, those people that have said hi, I can't tell you how many have become friends. Do we talk in class? No, they are exchanging energy, but having that introduction of a name, you know, it it brings people a little bit less intimidated to practice besides somebody. So not only am I offering this energetic, we're all as a collective creating that for each other.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

Totally. And I once blindly signed up for a marathon and booked a trip to BC with people I said hello to in your yoga class. Who are some of my very, very good friends now. Um, but yeah, forget that. You never know what's gonna happen when you turn to your left and right and say hello. Right. And that's I love that. It's an energy exchange, it's totally what it is. Yes. Um, one thing I want to talk about. So yoga is such a it's a unique experience to the person, right? I say your yoga class is like a grab bag, you don't really know what you're gonna get. You kind of don't know why you went there or you do, but you get something totally different out of it. When I have to like work through emotional stuff, that's when I'm like, oh my god, I need to go to yoga. And I don't really know what the thing is yet, but it will become very clear to me. Um, but as somebody who's leading the class, because I feel like as a participant, you get very tunnel visioned in like your experience. What do you feel?

SPEAKER_03 13:36

Ooh.

SPEAKER_02 13:40

Sometimes I feel overwhelmed with the amount that is the energy. Again, I'm so in tune with it. I could feel this corner, you know, there's grief, this corner breakup, um, health thing. Like there, there could be a lot. Uh, and that's why I'm so passionate about even my my music, because my music, I want to make sure that it complements this type of environment that I'm in where um it's not pulling away from the experience, it's getting people into their bodies. That's the number one thing. But for me, when there's a lot of energy around, the best way that I works for me is if you see me at the front and I have my feet planted, sometimes my right foot on a block, that means I need to anchor. And I just I stand there. So that's a little like a little hint. So if I'm doing that in class, there's a lot of things happening energetically, and I need to be anchored and grounded to access space for everyone else to access their space. If I'm all over the place because there's a lot of energy, I don't feel like I can really get in, and then I'm operating on top of something that takes me out of my teaching.

SPEAKER_00 15:06

Does that make sense? Yeah, totally. I'm thinking about too when we would do the events at Spencer's, like I would do group Reiki for it.

SPEAKER_03 15:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

That's that was exactly my experience. And sometimes I would have to step out, breathe, and come back in to move it. But I mean, this just goes right back to energy work so beyond just your hands. I'm like, oh, it's because my Reiki's on and I'm here doing Reiki. But it's like everybody could feel it. Claudia, who comes in does uh sambles, she could feel it, like, and she was not even doing Reiki, she was on her sambles. Like, yeah, you can that's wild that you feel that every class I know.

SPEAKER_02 15:39

And you know that's a lot to hold. Yes, it is, and I just give it my as best as I can, my 110% in that room. Um, you know, coming from a very busy, high-input brain, ADHD brain, I zone in, you know, you like zone in on the thing that you love, that's me teaching. I don't hear anything else. So that's where I thrive. And when I'm done, I need to have a moment to get into my own space to be able to fill myself up because I've literally given everything to be in that space. And you said something earlier around uh your experience when you perform Reiki at the Spencer's, or when you said when it gets to be or will me, you take a breath. That is exactly what I do. I can't do that when I'm walking. That's I gotta do that when I'm standing in my Tadasana, my true north. I allow that breath to to just like get back into my feet, and then I'm back in. Yeah. And I can do it again, I can do it again. I don't get tired from that.

unknown 16:54

That's wild.

SPEAKER_02 16:55

Yeah, I know it's it's it's very interesting.

SPEAKER_00 16:58

What is your I hate to use the word self-care, but I'm gonna say self-care. Yeah. What is your self-care look like? Either routine or like, is it not routine? It's just when you move energy like that, you have to fill back up. What is what is filling back up look like to you?

SPEAKER_02 17:16

Uh is this just before I teach, or is this like I wake up and what do I do? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:20

What do you do when let's look into the life of Anetta?

SPEAKER_02 17:24

Okay. Oh, this will be interesting. Uh honestly, for the in the mornings, I really love burning Palo Santo. It's it's it's what my go-to. Uh every single morning I do that. And I like to actually wand it around my feet. Uh, I love my coffee in the morning, uh, my dogs. I go outside if I can and I focus on my feet for like five breaths. Uh, yes, my brain spins. So I don't want to sound like, and then I put the thoughts away. No, the thoughts are happening very loudly, but uh I breathe through the thoughts and I don't get, I don't get sucked in. And I think it's because I've developed a strong meditation practice that I used to think needed to be, you know, 30 minutes or more longer. It's a perfect setting. I don't do that anymore. I am well over 300 days and I consecutively for four or five minutes, and that's good for me. So that's a ritual that I keep. Uh, one of the rituals that I always keep before I teach is you've got, you've seen it. You come in. How many people do I hug before class? A lot. I make my rounds in class, I make sure my team's good. But what I do is I go to the back office, I lock it, and I close my eyes and I say, you know, I'm gonna teach this class for everyone's highest and best. And I take, again, some breaths. Uh, no one bothers me at that time. I I can't constantly be in the I've learned that I can't. It takes me a lot longer to be back into holding space for people if I'm right to the right to the end before I have to start. Yeah. Hi, hi, hi, hi, hi. Even though I love doing that. But if I'm gonna teach a powerful class, I need at least like a couple minutes privately um to be in my own in my own space.

SPEAKER_00 19:24

Yeah, I love that you said that. We um my last week's episode I did on like what is Reiki, what is energy work. Um, and I said, like, no matter what tool you're using, be it Reiki, be it yoga, be it mediumship, it's always the root principle is for the highest and best. So I am obsessed with the fact that that's that's the mantra of going in because everybody truly will, there's no ego there. Yeah, there's absolutely no ego there. Truly everybody will get what is meant for the highest and best.

SPEAKER_02 19:53

You've inspired me with that phrase. You always say that in our sessions, and I think it's something that's now stuck with me because what's better than that?

SPEAKER_00 20:02

Yeah, right. And sometimes for your highest and best, and I I think people get confused with this, like when we're talking about energy work and meditation and and inner growth, they think it's all like love and light. Yeah, it's not sometimes your highest and best is is laying in sabbassana and balling your eyes out. 100%. And that's what you need, and it's the surrender to like whatever is meant for me will come for me, and I have to surrender and accept it.

SPEAKER_02 20:26

And that right there is the advanced practice, it is not the splits. I tell people like, yeah, of course, people have goals, everyone's different. But to me, an advanced practitioner, an advanced yogi is somebody that can be so aware of what they need in class or not feeling like they have to suffer through and know that the highest and best is to feel what you need to feel, and if and then to just sit in it and breathe through it and not have to feel like there needs to be drama around it, or perform or hide, you know what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_00 21:01

Yeah, I uh so Lisa, for anybody who doesn't know uh Lisa, Anetta and Lisa are uh co-owners of Soulful Wellness uh yoga retreats, check them out. Yes, I typically get to Lisa's class now and I went out to her a couple weeks ago and I apologized for being in child's pose for like too long. And she goes, never apologize for that. She goes, You you got it. You got it. If I see people in child's pose when we're not in child's pose, she's like, I'm so happy because they're just they're doing exactly what their body needs, and that's the point of this.

SPEAKER_02 21:36

100%. I love that she said that. And um, please don't apologize for ever going into your child's pose, babe. I I lived there. Or people, a biggest one people apologize to for crying. I'm so sorry, I'm crying. It's like it's released. Oh my gosh, tremendous. It's like a compliment. Here's your gold skin. Yeah, right.

SPEAKER_00 21:54

You cried today. Yes, you're very welcome. They say that a lot. Um people apologize. Of the first time in here. Ask you or Ricky, we're always crying in here. I always say, you know, if you're not crying, I'm not doing my job.

SPEAKER_01 22:06

Yeah. Perfect. Yep. Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 22:10

Um, okay. I want to talk about playlists. I want to talk about business life success, I guess. I feel I feel like we've both kind of gone through this. Not to say like we're slowing down, but I think that we've gotten to an age where we like reprioritize. What would you say maybe even pre-COVID success looked like to you and what does success look like to you now?

SPEAKER_02 22:44

Pre-COVID and what does success look like to me now? Um I think before COVID, success looked like meeting as many people as I could, learning about as many people as I could in Burlington. I was new to Burlington. Uh, for those of you know people that don't know, I moved from New York City and uh I didn't really know where Burlington was, even though I grew up in Oakville. That's hilarious. Yes, uh, and now Burlington, obsessed. But uh that was very successful for me to realize how many amazing people live in this corner part of the world, and to just get them enrolled into the studio. Um, I've made a lot of friends in 2019 that was very successful that felt like really successful for me, and starting to see the growth of the space and how much uh opportunity there was to build in this room. Like I knew that it something magical was gonna be happening there. So I would say that success looked the most to me making connections. And then if I were to say now my success is seeing how PYC Burlington has become this like the center hub of the wheel, and these spokes, all so many spokes have come out of it, and then people creating their own things together, right? Collaborating here, meeting besties, doing so many great things for the city and beyond. That, but yet to know that it started in this space just makes me so that to me, I feel so rich in seeing how much it's impacted people's lives and what they've done with it. Um now I feel I I nurture a lot of those connections and relationships and spend now time. Oh my gosh, I know this amazing woman, you know, that would do so well with your business. And I I'm also actively connecting everybody. Whereas before it was, hi, I'm Anetta, what's your name? Learning about everybody. So, and it's cool to see that the studio, I never wanted it to be, you know, the Anetta show ever. Uh, I want everyone to feel um supported and seen, and it very much be their studio as much as mine. Some teachers will be like, oh, they'll say your studio, and I cut them right off at that right time and say, it's our studio, okay? Um and now being able to just, I travel a lot now for the retreats and whatnot, and to see that the studio is thriving, even when I'm not there, because I've created this beautiful container that people just feel like that that's attraction, not promotion, really.

SPEAKER_00 25:44

Totally, totally. I can see it too. I can just even from everybody back like when the door is first opened. For people who don't know this story, 2020 lockdown. Um, it was just opening, reopening after the world shut down. Um, and that it was allowed 10 people per class in a 65-person room. I did not like yoga, um, but I was really burnt out. I was treating left, right, and center, just like holding space for people because osseo and like manual therapy was one of the few things you could leave your house and do. Um, so I was really burnt out, and my clients were like, you know, you you need to meet this girl Anetta, like just go to her studio. And I blindly bought a year, like up front, not even on a payment plan, like just bought a year to the studio because I was so just drawn to it. It attracted me. There was some I don't we've never even met, I don't think. It was like a I think you were teaching Tuesdays, 930. No, it was your Thursday, 9:30. There's a I taught like 24 classes a week, so definitely one of those. Yeah, and I that's how this all began. But from being in rooms with those people to now seeing what you're saying, like it's it's community is like even too small of a word for like how big it has all gotten and grown. It's so wild to see like how much has changed and successfully.

SPEAKER_02 27:08

It's become like a community of friendship, a community of um small business owners, a community of you know, recently this summer solstice event, over 300 people, the community of vendors, yeah, right? All of that, and that's what I mean. It's not just the word community where you think like this group of people.

SPEAKER_00 27:27

Totally, totally. And I've been in classes too where people have come like from Toronto, and they're like, you need to pre-book the class. You're like, yeah, and probably get on the wait list. Like, not in an egotistical way, but it's like that's what it is. Everybody is just like drawn and attracted to it. I love it. Um, I have a kind of a two-part question. So, one is I work with a lot of instructors, yoga instructors, spin instructors, a lot of instructors, and I think a big part of instructing is like you're sharing, you're constantly sharing. Um, and so one question I had from somebody was, how do you decide when being vulnerable what to share and what not to share? And my other question would be: I have instructors who say, like, I feel less than because I can't stand up in front of the room and share these like vulnerabilities. Like, what advice would you have for those people?

SPEAKER_02 28:32

Well, I I'd be curious. I if you know me, I ask a lot of questions because I I always like to leave a conversation. Uh my goal is to understand the person in front of me. So if I don't understand, I just keep asking, excavating. So I'd want to know like, what do you mean you'd be less than because you can't share? What's what's the can't behind that?

SPEAKER_00 28:53

They feel like they don't they don't feel called to like share personally what they're going through. Okay. And then the other part of the question would be how do you decide what you share and what not to share? Okay.

SPEAKER_02 29:06

If you're not called to share, don't share. That would be my tip, my recommendation, because then it feels forced. Uh and I say that because I did it. I would look up to teachers who would just roll vulnerability off their tongue, like easy. And so when I would try it, it sounded very fabricated, very performative. Um, so I would just say it will come. Like if you, if that's something that you really want to do, like you said, breadcrumbs, little bite-sized ways and conversations. Maybe it starts with your friends. Are you vulnerable with your friend friends? Or are you vulnerable? Period. If you're not vulnerable, period, what makes you think it's gonna be easy to be vulnerable in front of a class? You know what I'm saying? So I think it would just be okay, if if my goal is to be more vulnerable, first be vulnerable with yourself, have a conversation with yourself in the mirror. You know, how how are you though? Like really, and then things will just come up and have a time to sit, grab your drink, tea, coffee, whatever, and just let vulnerability almost come to you, or you don't have to find pockets to find it. Uh, there are times in class where nothing is coming, it means it's not supposed to be in that class. For me, otherwise, it feels you know, you're like forcing something to happen. You it just doesn't, it's almost like the person that's receiving is like, it feels like she was just like really trying hard there. Uh, not that that's wrong. I think we all have to start somewhere in relationships too, right? If if we want to fall in love again, if we've had a heartbreak, right? Gotta start, may feel a little weird in the beginning, but it gets easier. Um, me for vulnerability, it's sometimes I'll just look at, you know, what happened today or what what's the key thing that I'm going through? What's the overarching theme of that? Is it acceptance, forgiveness? Where am I judging? Uh, and then from there I will bring that into my class. And I'll always make sure that I create uh a share in vulnerability that is tangible in the body to be felt. So if I say, you know, if I'm talking about surrender and I say something about my family where I'm having a really hard time, and you know, this is how it shows up, and we're in, let's say, a lizard pose where everyone's on their forearms, but they're not doing anything with their hip, I'll say, just like if your pose is all up in your arms and you're bracing to hold yourself up above water, nothing, there's no space happening in your hips, there's no space for you to feel your emotion. So, like, soften, surrender. That's that's where you want to like um experience. And when you do that, then students have the experience of something that they can action. Sometimes when you become vulnerable in a class, it become it take it can take them out of the experience. Now they're in their heads, they're in a story. But if you could share something that in the moment soften their knee joints, right? If something, if you're talking about softening in your life, you're being hardened by something, and you tell them soften your knee joints, boom, like, huh, where else am I hardening? Oh my god, look at my jaw. Yeah, right, then everybody has a piece to feel and be like, huh, I can change that. If I could change that, what else can I change?

unknown 32:53

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 32:55

Wow, my mind is exploding right now. Also, because I think too, and again, like back to energy, everything's energy. It's like there's a very mental component and there's a very physical component, and you have to release both, and you're just walking us through like it's another day in the park, like, yep, and then you do think this, move this, and boom, release. That's why everybody's crying, ladies and gentlemen. Because we're all releasing because we just got a masterclass and how to be vulnerable.

SPEAKER_02 33:24

I can share though, uh, quickly a story that where this all started was again back to that resistance. My resistance was when my ex and I decided to divorce and I had to teach class that night. And at the time I was living in Manhattan and I needed to get on that subway. My legs gave out. I never forget this day. I called my boss. I was at 14th and 6th, waiting to get on that subway, and I said, I cannot teach this class. I need you to please sub it out. And she talked me through it and said, Anetta, I will be there with you. This, I promise you, will be the best class you will teach because up to this point, you have been teaching like a sunshine cheerleader for everyone, which is great, she said. And there's no access into who you are, and like that vulnerability piece wasn't there because I was very much a people pleaser, you know. I wanted to make sure everyone loved my class. I gotta do what you what Alan, I know Alana likes abs, so we gotta do abs. And then I love she loves this. There was never any type of emotion other than joy from me all the time, yeah. Just not not meaning that I'm gonna go in being an ass, but being real. Shut up, yeah, right. So I somehow got up, I took, I taught the class, and I was shaking, and I probably had mascara all over my face, but I I was just real, and it was that's when my numbers, boom, I'm not kidding, within the next 30 days or so or two months, my classes were packed.

SPEAKER_00 35:05

Feels like a breadcrumb to me. That is a breadcrumb. We just we just discovered a breadcrumb. Looking back, you could always shape them. That's amazing, though.

SPEAKER_02 35:14

I actually had goosebumps through because when you when you're exhausted from like performing and trying and looking good, and when all that is like, oh, what do you have left? You become so grounded, so in your body, because there's no extra, extra, you're just in your feet, and that's what I felt in class. I could actually finally see my students.

SPEAKER_00 35:38

Yeah, I feel like that applies to to literally anything in life. Like if you feel like your life is a performance, is it exhausting? It's like strip it all back, even to that conversation having with yourself in the mirror. Like, yeah, how are you though? And strip it all back. You don't have to be teaching a yoga class, but wow, 100%.

unknown 36:01

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

Okay, I'm like, where do we go from here? Oh man, that uh that took me back. Yeah, so again, like when you said, you know, um, thank you for sharing how you experience me now, but that was the definitely the breadcrumb, and it came from a divorce. Yeah. The right? Yeah. A day where I could not peel myself off the floor.

SPEAKER_00 36:26

Yeah. But it cracked you wide open. Cracked me wide open, yes.

unknown 36:32

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 36:34

What would you say? I don't even know how to phrase these questions for you because you're such a musical genius. What has I mean, you are a Pisces and Pisces just get music. They feel it viscerally. They are the music sign. There are a lot of signs. I want a Pisces so bad. But all of my girlfriends are Pisces. Um was music always, did music always play this role in your life?

SPEAKER_02 37:01

Yes, I would say so. Uh I one of the biggest memories I have, I was six years old in grade one at the time, and the locomotion song came on, and it was like the most popular song. I managed to get the entire school, think of grade one, got the grade eights to come and we did a dance on the hill singing this song, and I feel like thinking of the story, I feel like that's what music does for me bringing everyone together, right? I feel like bread crumb, oh my gosh, that's so fun!

SPEAKER_01 37:37

Holy crap. Um, yeah, and that's kind of what I do now, right?

SPEAKER_00 37:42

Totally. I I still have saved, so I'm sure nobody forgets that we went in and out of lockdown like three times. Um, we were allowed back, and then we got shut down again, and you did the class that would end at midnight. And we literally went we went to the yoga studio at 11 p.m. I still have that playlist saved on my Spotify. It's called Lockdown Eve, and I still weep, and for like so many different reasons. It's like it gives me whatever I need in the moment, but sometimes I'm just like going through it and uh I'll put on the Lockdown Eve playlist, and it's I I love that. I didn't know that. I don't know how you how you do what you do. How do you build a playlist, or is it just you're in a flow state?

SPEAKER_02 38:37

Uh sometimes, I mean, sometimes it's easy. I I am in that flow state and it comes really quick. Um, sometimes I have to build it throughout the week and I'll listen to new tracks or listen to a I love beats. Beats is where it's at for me in a yoga class. Words as well, but I lean more to um beats like songs that want to make you move your pelvis, you know. Uh instrumental, uh definitely some lyrical songs, but um I don't like to overplay those either. And I'll put I'll file them away. I'll be like, okay, this would be really good in a you know on a Tuesday night or a every class that you take on my schedule, I teach four, uh, they're all a different experience. So that's really cool for me. Like a Thursday, 9:30 is gonna get like a Noah Con. Whereas like a Tuesday, I'm playing Rufus to soul and all that cool stuff, right? Actually, I'd probably pay that on Thursday and a Sunday as well, but imagine love Rufus. Um, yeah, there's there's definitely a technique. I am gonna be bringing out a module for people to uh learn how to put music together and what will bring feet to the room, or yeah, I would say it's more for instructors, yoga teachers.

SPEAKER_00 39:56

I was gonna say, are we soft launching something? Can anybody come? Yes, anybody can come. Anybody can come. I love that. I want that. I feel like you've also from being in class have expanded like my musical genre. Um, but simply the best will always be.

SPEAKER_02 40:13

I think we're still an 80s girl.

SPEAKER_00 40:15

I know, I know. But it has, I have Reefus on my playlist now. Okay, I know we'll be in the car. And Jay was like, this feels very exciting.

SPEAKER_01 40:23

I love that so much.

SPEAKER_00 40:25

Um, okay, I think my final, my final question, and it's funny because we're talking about music, and you sent me the summit. Yes. Um so why we're the summit, right? In hiking, we always talk about like the summit is the hardest part of the hike with the highest reward. Um, and not a lot of people, we have false summits and we have true summits. So if we're looking at a at a hike, you can go to a false summit. It's a pretty view. You worked kind of hard, but we're not really gonna go the full way because it's really hard and it's a little bit risky, and here's good enough. And I always say, you know, the summit collective, the summit effect, we're we're for the people who want to go summit all the way to the top. That being said, are you summiting anything right now?

SPEAKER_02 41:09

Oh question. Am I summiting anything right now? I feel like I feel like every day I am a cheat trying to like reach for the summit in some capacity of all the hats that I wear. I I could even take this, you know, the summit to me is how do I be better today for my team, for them to uh be in their fullest, fullest expression and their teaching and the you know, I have over 50 energy exchange staff. What would make them want to come to the studio and be their their very best? So there's that side, there's uh the personal development side. I I am working on something, hopefully soon launching. It's been uh it's been a work in progress from a place of who am I, right? I I get those all the time. Who am I to roll this out? Uh someone's already doing it, and I'm that could be probably the biggest as I see myself climbing that summit. This is the piece that's once I break this, which I feel like I'm getting better at, I feel like the peak's just right there, and then it's gonna feel so good. Um, so that's what I'm working on. Um what else? Gosh. I was gonna ask you from like a perspective of how you see me working summit because I literally feel like I have 18 mountains that I want to climb all at the same time, and then where do I have time for you know other things that I really want?

SPEAKER_00 42:53

I know.

SPEAKER_02 42:53

I feel that needs space, like chill out. How do you do all these things? I get that question all the time.

SPEAKER_00 43:00

That I mean, that was the number one question. Oh, fantastic. Well, I feel like this answer could be twofold. One, um, we're dancing around maybe a launch of something that you'll have to come back for part two and we'll launch it. But two, people don't know this, but we're actually going into and that is cache of records after this. Yes. We're gonna answer some questions. But I mean, I think that's part of summoning too, though. You you know you're at the base of something and you actually don't even know what you're about to climb, but you're there and you're working, you're putting in the work, you're doing the preparation. I feel like that's in one aspect where you're at.

SPEAKER_02 43:39

Yeah. And uh in that song it said, like, think about the person you are on the climb. You know, at the top crate, you're done, great. But like, who are you becoming on your way? You're almost at the peak, and it's like what I'm hearing now is oh, the imposter syndrome. Like, stop it, stop it. It's it's getting It out of the way, like you're you're almost there, and then when I get up there, I'm gonna remember that for the next summit that I want to take on. Where I'm like, oh yeah, I've experienced this before. Totally, all good. What's the next obstacle?

SPEAKER_00 44:12

I got this, and that's what like it's all it's it's about the journey, not the destination. Yep, right. And it's we all I think we focus too so much on here's the end goal, but like, are you enjoying it in between? I mean, depending what you're hiking, no, but I just want I just wanna get in the fucking top.

SPEAKER_02 44:31

You know, some people thrive and do really well at one summit in their mindset and their world. This is what I'm focusing on, this is what I'm gonna master. Uh, I think it's really important, right? To master something for sure. We need tens and thousands of hours to do that. My brain thrives at doing four or having the to know that there's four available, and I do dance between the four, but for me, that is not overwhelming. I I I like love it. I thrive on that.

SPEAKER_00 45:05

Are you a manifesting generator? I am, yeah, me too. Manifesting generators with ADHD. What? What? Combo dangerous, but I'm the same, and I feel like at this season in my life too, I am trying, I think I'm forcing myself to do one and master one, and it's exhausting. Right. It's just easier to do four. And some people be like, what the? I know, I know. So, listener, take that at maybe go to discover what your human design is. If you're a manifesting generator, this conversation hits. If this gives you anxiety, you're probably a generator or projector. But um, okay. I mean, we're gonna have to have you back for part two later. But that was so fun. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02 45:56

And thank you, everyone that wrote out their questions to me. That was so sweet.

SPEAKER_00 46:00

I literally everybody's was like, you're amazing. You're a unicorn, keep doing what you're doing, but how do you do what you do? It's the secret sauce, you'll find out down the road.

SPEAKER_02 46:12

I just I don't know. I love I love putting myself to a challenge, that's for sure. I think I gotta spend more time though on um celebrating myself along the challenge. And I think that would go for a lot of people. We're always in the like more, more, more, more. But then we look back. Oh, did I even like go out for dinner and celebrate that milestone for myself? You know, where can I find these pockets? And they don't have to be big. To acknowledge ourselves, to clap for ourselves. Stop waiting for everyone to clap for you. Not everyone's gonna clap for you. Truly, but you can clap for yourself every damn day. You look in the mirror and you say, like, I'm a big fucking deal. Yeah, I work hard, and I'm also going to acknowledge that. Otherwise, you'll burn out.

SPEAKER_00 46:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:58

And we've all been there too. Totally. We don't want to do that.

SPEAKER_00 47:00

Totally.

SPEAKER_02 47:00

Every person And that's why we see you.

SPEAKER_00 47:03

Every person listening to this podcast is nodding their head like burnout. Yeah, been there. It's like we talk about it every episode. Um, okay. If you don't know Anetta, you should. If you're local, uh come see us at Burley PYC. If you are looking for a retreat, check out Soulful Yoga Wellness. Soulful Yoga Wellness. Um follow what's your what's your Instagram handle? Uh Aneta Pie underscore. I was gonna say that your old one. Um check her out. She's got stuff coming down the pipeline. And uh yeah, that's all we have for you today. Aneta, thank you. I love you. I love you too. Thank you so much. We will see you next Wednesday. Bye guys.